Chinese High Speed Train Trip - Beijing to Shenzhen

2 weeks ago I took the 10am G79 train from Beijing to Shenzhen. Now....I've taken many high speed trains from around the world including Shinkansen and TGV's but I must say that I have never seen anything quite like the Chinese bullet trains in terms of consistent speed and smoothness of ride quality. It was a slightly surreal experience.

Basically, as soon as you accelerate from a station, you speed up to around 300 km/h (I was always at 307km/h) and the speed just stays there like its nothing. It generally does not slow down unless....you approach another station for a short stop. Of course the curves are very gentle to maintain high speeds as well as having very long straight sections but I'm guessing these trains are able to hold such an amazing average speed due to the lines being nowhere near full capacity in terms of frequency?

I'm aware of the crazy amount of Shinkansen trains that are run each hour during peak times but even the TGV trains run a high number of trains per hour at peak hours too.

What also struck me was the ride quality. I took the CRH380B and the ride was easily the most smoothest that I have ever experienced. Felt a lot more smooth than any Shinkansen that I've rode on. Is this mainly due to the ballastless track?

I made a short video to highlight the sense of speed at mostly 307 km/h as well as the consistency of it:

I agree with you that the chinese bullet train is amazing!
I love to travel by train in other countries whenever it is possible. Last month, we traveled in China by CRH bullet train(CRH2A) from Guilin to Congjiang among the Karst mountains. The maximum speed of that trip was only 247km/h, but it was the easiest way to travel in that rural mountainous area.
In the past a few years, we traveled in China from Shenzhen to Guangzhou, Guangzhou to Xi'an,Beijing to Guangzhou,Xi'an to Beijing and Beijing to Shanghai all by bullet train. The longest train journey I took was the Beijing to Guangzhou one, 2300 km, 8 hours! Very reasonable price.
The high speed train from Shanghai to Beijing is also very frequent, maybe 3-4 trains per hour.

I agree with you that the chinese bullet train is amazing!
I love to travel by train in other countries whenever it is possible. Last month, we traveled in China by CRH bullet train(CRH2A) from Guilin to Congjiang among the Karst mountains. The maximum speed of that trip was only 247km/h, but it was the easiest way to travel in that rural mountainous area.
In the past a few years, we traveled in China from Shenzhen to Guangzhou, Guangzhou to Xi'an,Beijing to Guangzhou,Xi'an to Beijing and Beijing to Shanghai all by bullet train. The longest train journey I took was the Beijing to Guangzhou one, 2300 km, 8 hours! Very reasonable price.
The high speed train from Shanghai to Beijing is also very frequent, maybe 3-4 trains per hour.

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Wish I could have travelled to more places on the CRH bullet trains! It's just amazing how these trains can constantly maintain over 300 km/h for such long distances

Wish I could have travelled to more places on the CRH bullet trains! It's just amazing how these trains can constantly maintain over 300 km/h for such long distances

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Most HSR trains run in the daytime,7 am to 11pm,and are maitained at night. I saw a video made by a swedish guy on youtube, a coin can balance on the window sill on the chinese train at 300km/h. I think the high quality of track is the most important factor.https://youtu.be/yUtS8M90Fto

Most HSR trains run in the daytime,7 am to 11pm,and are maitained at night. I saw a video made by a swedish guy on youtube, a coin can balance on the window sill on the chinese train at 300km/h. I think the high quality of track is the most important factor.https://youtu.be/yUtS8M90Fto

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When Roger Ford used to do unofficial ride tests of new stock and write about them in Modern Railways, he always did a coin balance test. All the sprinters passed!

Been on a few D-trains over the last few weeks, pretty steady at 246kph for most of the way. The only stress in the journey is the ticket collection fiasco at the station each time... Wish they'd let non-prc citizens use the collection TVM machines. On a K-train next week, only for two hours just to experience the true horror of ancient Chinese Railways.

Been on a few D-trains over the last few weeks, pretty steady at 246kph for most of the way. The only stress in the journey is the ticket collection fiasco at the station each time... Wish they'd let non-prc citizens use the collection TVM machines. On a K-train next week, only for two hours just to experience the true horror of ancient Chinese Railways.

Lol... K train was horrific. 22 carriages long, with all passengers squeezed inexplicably into just four of them. My friend in the know reckons it was so they didn't have to clean them at the end of the night.

No smoking signs up. Staff smoking! People with chicken in boxes, and I'm not talking about KFC either. You couldn't make it up.

Lol... K train was horrific. 22 carriages long, with all passengers squeezed inexplicably into just four of them. My friend in the know reckons it was so they didn't have to clean them at the end of the night.

No smoking signs up. Staff smoking! People with chicken in boxes, and I'm not talking about KFC either. You couldn't make it up.

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4 of the 22 carriages are for passengers and what are the other 18 carriages for? From my experience, K trains have aircon, and yes there were some people smoking in the joints of two carriages, but never saw people smoke inside the carriage of K trains. I have never seen a passenger train with 22 carriages. 16 or 18 carriages is the longest one i took about 10 years ago.

I have no idea nowadays how the K trains is. However, it was not horrific from my experience,maybe very crowded during holidays.

4 of the 22 carriages are for passengers and what are the other 18 carriages for? From my experience, K trains have aircon, and yes there were some people smoking in the joints of two carriages, but never saw people smoke inside the carriage of K trains. I have never seen a passenger train with 22 carriages. 16 or 18 carriages is the longest one i took about 10 years ago.

I have no idea nowadays how the K trains is. However, it was not horrific from my experience,maybe very crowded during holidays.

I wonder which K Train this was.
I have travelled on 100's of Chinese trains, many of them K Trains. I too have never seen one longer than 20 coaches and that would include a baggage car and a crew car, possibly a generator car too.
Smoking is permitted in the vestibules but , in my experience, the coach attendants are very firm with anyone who smokes in a coach. That said the train policemen are often to be found smoking in the restaurant car.
Chickens in boxes or even in carrier bags is not unusual. On the last T Train I travelled on a guy got on with a dead sheep and left it in the vestibule.

Taizhou Jiangsu to Nanjing.... Last one of the night. Possibly a stock move.

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I guess K8468.
Unusually , for China, the trains between Taizhou and Nanjing have large amounts of availability even for tomorrow. The way the computer ticketing works I suspect they just fill it up from the front, which explains the empty coaches. I don't think this was a stock move.